88 Fun Facts About The Sword in the Stone

What is Wart trying to retrieve when he first meets Merlin?

An arrow from the spoiled hunt leads Wart to Merlin, who promptly declares himself the boy's tutor.

The Sword in the Stone's songwriters also wrote which theme park anthem?

It's a Small World was written for the UNICEF pavilion at the 1964 New York World's Fair.

Which creature does Madam Mim become during the wizards' duel, breaking her own rules?

A purple dragon: Mim had banned 'pink dragons and stuff', so she argued a purple one didn't count.

Which animal keeps trying to catch Wart in the forest, only to fail every time?

A wolf nearly eats Wart during the squirrel lesson, but a girl squirrel saves him before discovering he is a boy.

What does Merlin enchant to do Wart's punishment chores in The Sword in the Stone?

The dishes wash themselves so Merlin can take Wart off for another lesson, and Sir Ector later blames black magic.

What does Merlin conjure indoors to prove his magic to Sir Ector?

A blizzard proves the magic to Sir Ector, who still turns Merlin away until the wizard vanishes and Ector changes his mind.

What is the name of Wart's older foster brother?

Kay is the brother whose sword Wart forgets at the inn, which sends Wart to the sword in the stone.

Into which creature does Merlin first transform Wart for a lesson?

As fish, Merlin and Wart swim the castle moat until an angry pike attacks them.

What lesson are the squirrel transformations meant to teach Wart?

Gravity is the plan, but the squirrel lesson ends with Merlin calling love the greatest force on Earth.

Which bird does Merlin turn Wart into for his flying lesson?

As a sparrow, Wart learns to fly with Archimedes, and the lesson ends with him meeting the witch Madam Mim.

In Disney comics, Madam Mim often teams up with which other sorceress?

Magica De Spell often took Mim on as a sidekick in 1960s and 1970s comics, hounding Scrooge McDuck.

How does Merlin finally defeat Madam Mim in their wizards' duel?

He becomes a germ that infects her, leaving Mim sick and confined to bed.

Where does Merlin angrily transport himself after arguing with Wart?

From 20th-century Bermuda he returns at the end to help Wart, now king, become the great ruler he foresaw.

What does Wart find when he rushes back to the inn for the sword he forgot?

The inn is locked for the tournament, so Wart pulls the sword from the stone instead, unknowingly proving he is king.

What is the sword embedded in, atop the stone?

An anvil atop the stone holds the sword, which appears after the king dies without an heir.

Which king's death leaves England without an heir at the start of The Sword in the Stone?

Uther Pendragon's death leaves the sword forgotten for years, plunging England into the Dark Ages.

On what day is the tournament to crown England's next king held in The Sword in the Stone?

New Year's Day is set for the tournament, so Sir Ector enters his son and appoints Wart as that son's squire.

Which actor voiced Merlin in The Sword in the Stone?

Karl Swenson later played Lars Hanson on Little House on the Prairie and died about a week before his character's death episode aired.

Who voiced Sir Ector and narrated The Sword in the Stone?

Sebastian Cabot was away from Family Affair for a while, so John Williams stood in as Mr. French's brother Nigel.

Who voiced Madam Mim?

Martha Wentworth voiced Mim, who challenges Merlin to a wizards' duel and cheats her way through it.

Why was Arthur voiced by three different actors in The Sword in the Stone?

The original actor hit puberty: Rickie Sorensen's voice broke mid-production, so Arthur's voice shifts between scenes.

In T. H. White's novels, why does the wizard Merlyn already know what will happen?

He lives backwards in time, so knowing Wart's destiny, he readies the boy to rule by turning him into animals.

Who wrote both the story and screenplay for The Sword in the Stone?

Bill Peet developed the story single-handedly, then left Disney in 1964 after clashing with Walt over a later film.

Which rival project lost out to The Sword in the Stone for Walt Disney's approval?

Chanticleer's rooster hero was judged too odd to work, and Walt said nobody feels like picking up a rooster to pet it.

Seeing which Broadway musical prompted Walt Disney to greenlight The Sword in the Stone?

Camelot also led Walt to Julie Andrews: he saw her play Guinevere and offered her the role of Mary Poppins.

Who wrote the songs for The Sword in the Stone?

The Sherman Brothers joined Disney as staff songwriters after their hit Tall Paul for Mouseketeer Annette Funicello.

Who composed the score for The Sword in the Stone?

George Bruns kept playing jazz while at Disney, including with the studio's in-house Dixieland band, the Firehouse Five Plus Two.

The Sword in the Stone's only Oscar nomination was in which category?

It lost to Irma la Douce.

Which animation technique carried over from 101 Dalmatians to The Sword in the Stone?

Xerox photocopying of drawings onto cels continued, joined by a new touch-up step that let assistants draw directly on animators' sketches.

In which city did The Sword in the Stone hold its premiere on December 12, 1963?

London premiered the film, which went on to inspire a Sword in the Stone ceremony at Disney's theme parks.

The Sword in the Stone's 1983 re-release came with a new short about which Pooh character's birthday?

Eeyore is delighted to find he can put Piglet's popped balloon into Pooh's empty honey pot and take it out again.

In which video game series does Merlin train Sora, Donald and Goofy in magic?

Kingdom Hearts began after a Square producer pitched the idea to a Disney executive during a chance meeting in an elevator.

T. H. White's novel later became the first part of which tetralogy?

The Once and Future King reworked White's first novel, cutting the Madam Mim duel that Disney's film kept.

Which retrospective honour did White's book receive in 2014?

A Hugo for 1939 went to the novel White wrote about Arthur's boyhood, the part of the legend Malory's Le Morte d'Arthur leaves out.

The Sword in the Stone's director belonged to which famous group of Disney animators?

The Nine Old Men got their name from Walt, borrowing a nickname for the aging justices of the US Supreme Court.

The Sword in the Stone's writer resigned from Disney in 1964 after a row over which film?

The Jungle Book's early version kept Kipling's dark tone, so Walt had the story lightened and told his team to set the book aside.

The voice of Sir Ector went on to play which Disney jungle character?

Bagheera finds the baby Mowgli and, years later, tries to lead him to the Man-Village.

Where was T. H. White born?

Bombay, British India, was his birthplace; later he tried to train a goshawk by old falconry methods and wrote The Goshawk about it.

What kind of bird is Archimedes, Merlin's grumpy and highly educated talking pet in Disney's The Sword in the Stone?

An owl, and a reluctant teacher: when Merlin's talk of the future baffles Wart, Archimedes takes over the lessons and shows the boy how to fly.

Which author called Wart from The Sword in the Stone the spiritual ancestor of her own boy wizard?

J. K. Rowling has said T. H. White's writing strongly influenced the Harry Potter books, and critics often compare his absent-minded Merlyn with Albus Dumbledore.

Which legendary outlaw does Wart meet in T. H. White's The Sword in the Stone, in an adventure Disney's film dropped?

Robin Hood appears under the name Robin Wood, and it is Little John who first leads the boys to the outlaw and to Marian.

Thurl Ravenscroft, who voiced Sir Bart in The Sword in the Stone, was the longtime voice of which cereal mascot?

Tony the Tiger had Ravenscroft's booming bass for more than 50 years, though the singer was never credited in the Frosted Flakes commercials.

Alan Napier, the voice of Sir Pelinore in The Sword in the Stone, played which character in the 1960s Batman TV series?

Alfred Pennyworth, Bruce Wayne's butler, was the first role cast for the series, and Napier played him until its cancellation in 1968.

Arthur's three voice actors in Disney's The Sword in the Stone all give the medieval English boy which accent?

American accents clash with the British voices around Arthur, and because three boys shared the part, his voice sometimes changes within one scene.

What distinction does The Sword in the Stone hold among the animated features produced by Walt Disney himself?

Last released in his lifetime: Walt Disney died of lung cancer in December 1966, three years after The Sword in the Stone reached cinemas.

In later Arthurian romances, who gives King Arthur the sword Excalibur after the blade he drew from the stone breaks?

The Lady of the Lake hands over Excalibur in return for a favor to be named later, a debt she eventually comes to court to collect.

Which color does Merlin keep somewhere on his body in every animal form he takes in Disney's The Sword in the Stone?

Blue, the shade of the wizard's tunic and pointed hat, follows him into every transformation, and his glasses stay on as well.

Which illness strikes Hobbs before the big tournament, handing Wart back his old job in Disney's The Sword in the Stone?

The mumps lays Hobbs low just as Wart's foster brother is knighted, so Sir Ector puts the boy back at his side, much to Merlin's dismay.

Which job does Sir Ector give Wart for the tournament in The Sword in the Stone, serving his older foster brother?

Squire is as high as Wart can hope to rise in T. H. White's telling, because everyone at the castle believes the boy is of common birth.

Which animal does Wart scare off, spoiling his foster brother's hunt, at the start of Disney's The Sword in the Stone?

A deer gets away, the stray shot disappears into the forest, and Wart's search for it brings him face to face with Merlin.

Bryan Cogman, hired in 2015 to script a live-action The Sword in the Stone, was a writer on which HBO series?

Game of Thrones gave Cogman eleven episode credits, and he also wrote a companion book about the show, with a preface by the author of the original novels.

On which holiday did The Sword in the Stone open in US cinemas, a week after its British release?

Christmas Day 1963 was the US opening, and the film proved durable enough to return to cinemas in 1972 and again in 1983.

In T. H. White's The Sword in the Stone, where does Wart come across the sword that nobody else could pull free?

A churchyard, the setting the legend has used since about 1200, when a French poem first described the sword appearing beside a church.

Which insect does Merlyn turn Wart into in T. H. White's revised The Sword in the Stone, as a warning about tyranny?

An ant, thanks to magic sent through the bedroom keyhole while Wart is stuck in bed; the colony's rigid obedience is White's allusion to totalitarianism.

Which knight is the hero of The Ill-Made Knight, third book in the saga begun by The Sword in the Stone?

Sir Lancelot gives himself the nickname: T. H. White makes the bravest knight of the Round Table ugly and ape-like rather than handsome.

Which people from Gulliver's Travels does a girl find in Mistress Masham's Repose, by The Sword in the Stone's author?

Lilliputians, the tiny people Gulliver meets on his travels, have settled near her house in the children's book T. H. White published in 1946.

T. H. White called The Sword in the Stone a preface to which great work by Sir Thomas Malory?

Le Morte d'Arthur says nothing about Arthur's boyhood, which left White free to invent the years of lessons with Merlyn.

Which creature is King Pellinore forever hunting when Wart meets him in T. H. White's The Sword in the Stone?

The Questing Beast keeps White's bumbling Pellinore busy for life: when a friend talks him into giving up the chase, the creature pines away until he nurses it back to health and starts again.

In T. H. White's The Sword in the Stone, Wart gets lost in the forest while chasing which escaped bird of prey?

A goshawk slips away during falconry practice, and the chase leads Wart deep into the trees, where he ends up meeting Merlyn for the first time.

Which monster does Wart's foster brother slay in T. H. White's revised The Sword in the Stone, taking its head home?

A griffin attacks at the end of the boys' long stay with the outlaws of the forest, and its head goes back to the castle as a trophy.

As which bird does Wart fly so high that national borders vanish in T. H. White's revised The Sword in the Stone?

A wild goose, in a pacifist lesson: when Wart assumes the lookouts are watching for rival flocks, the idea of geese turning on their own kind offends them.

In T. H. White's The Sword in the Stone, which coronation gift from Sir Ector turns into the wizard Merlyn?

A dunce cap changes into Merlyn, who then tells the newly crowned boy the truth about his royal father and his real name.

Junius Matthews, the voice of Archimedes in The Sword in the Stone, later voiced which Winnie the Pooh character?

Rabbit brought Matthews wide fame only in the last ten years of his life, when he voiced the character in Disney's Pooh featurettes from 1966 to 1977.

The two replacement voices for Arthur in Disney's The Sword in the Stone were which relatives of the film's director?

His sons took over the part in mid-production, and a third son, Bruce, went on to voice Disney characters too.

In which country did T. H. White sit out World War II, writing sequels to The Sword in the Stone?

Ireland became White's home just before the war: he moved to County Meath and stayed there as a de facto conscientious objector.

In which city is T. H. White, author of The Sword in the Stone, buried after dying aboard a ship?

Athens holds White's grave because he died in January 1964 aboard a ship in its port, Piraeus, on the way home from a lecture tour of the United States.

In the 2023 short Once Upon a Studio, Merlin from The Sword in the Stone conjures water to save which Disney character?

Flounder gets his rescue when Moana asks the wizard for help and Merlin fills the Mad Hatter's hat with water.

A real medieval sword driven into rock, linked to the hermit knight Saint Galgano, survives in which Italian region?

Tuscany's Montesiepi chapel keeps the blade, which legend says Galgano thrust at the ground to show that giving up his sins was as impossible as splitting rock.

Jimmy MacDonald, who voiced an animal in The Sword in the Stone, inherited which character's voice from Walt Disney?

Mickey Mouse was MacDonald's from 1947 to 1976, after Walt Disney became too busy, and too hoarse from smoking, to go on voicing him.

Gregory Maguire named The Sword in the Stone's author as an influence on which 1995 novel, later a hit musical?

Wicked drew on what Maguire called T. H. White's ability to be broadminded, comic, poetic and fantastic all at once.

Which fairy-tale film of 1950 went into development beside The Sword in the Stone when Disney assigned writers in 1944?

Cinderella got its writers after a successful re-release of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, and it beat the Arthur film to cinemas by thirteen years.

Norman Alden, who voiced Wart's foster brother in The Sword in the Stone, later voiced which DC hero in Super Friends?

Aquaman was one of several heroes Alden voiced for the cartoon, and on screen he spent seven years as Lou the Mechanic in a run of advertisements.

Which English composer wrote the incidental music for the BBC's first radio serial of The Sword in the Stone?

Benjamin Britten composed the music specially for the six-part 1939 serial, and the BBC Orchestra played his score under conductor Leslie Woodgate.

Which burrowing mammal does Merlyn turn Wart into in T. H. White's The Sword in the Stone but not in Disney's film?

A badger is the shape Wart takes once his broken collarbone has healed, the injury that had kept the boy in bed for an earlier lesson.

On which Channel Island did T. H. White, author of The Sword in the Stone, settle in 1946 for good?

Alderney, the third-largest of the islands, remained White's home for the rest of his life, and he was sailing back there when he died.

In T. H. White's The Sword in the Stone, what is the name of the woodland that surrounds Sir Ector's castle?

Forest Sauvage shares its name with the castle it surrounds, and getting lost among its trees is how Wart first comes across Merlyn.

Which Billy Wilder comedy beat The Sword in the Stone to the one Academy Award that the Disney film was nominated for?

Irma la Douce won only after a mix-up on the night: presenter Sammy Davis Jr. was handed the wrong envelope and first read out a different winner.

Which shortcut, where assistants drew directly on the animators' sketches, was invented for The Sword in the Stone?

Touch-up replaced the old clean-up stage, in which every sketch was redrawn on fresh paper, and it left some assistants afraid of spoiling their animator's linework.

Which French poet's Merlin, written around 1200, is the first known tale to feature a sword in the stone?

Robert de Boron made the sword the proof of Arthur's lineage, a motif that most tellings of the king's youth have used ever since.

In the original 1938 text of The Sword in the Stone, which giant imprisons King Pellinore until his quarry rescues him?

Galapas ends the episode barricaded in his topmost tower, shouting to be rescued by the fire brigade, one of T. H. White's cheerful anachronisms.

Under which title did T. H. White first publish his sequel to The Sword in the Stone?

The Witch in the Wood, the story of Queen Morgause and her Orkney clan, was later cut down and rewritten as The Queen of Air and Darkness.

What name does T. H. White give to Arthur's Britain in the saga that opens with The Sword in the Stone?

Gramarye is where most of the saga unfolds, from the last years of the reign of Arthur's father through the boy's education and his own rule as king.

At which English boarding school did T. H. White teach for four years before he wrote The Sword in the Stone?

Stowe lost him in 1936, when he moved into a workman's cottage nearby to write and to take up falconry and hunting.

Which Disney animator, who also drew Shere Khan and Madame Medusa, animated Madam Mim for The Sword in the Stone?

Milt Kahl shared the wizards' duel with fellow animator Frank Thomas, and Madame Medusa was his last work for the studio before he retired in 1976.

By which nickname was Wolfgang Reitherman, director of The Sword in the Stone, known and sometimes credited?

Woolie was what colleagues called him, and Walt Disney reportedly asked Woolie whenever he wanted to know what the public would think of a film.

Which Ted Lasso actor played a young Merlin, founder of Merlin Academy, in the 2024 film Descendants: The Rise of Red?

Jeremy Swift, an Emmy nominee as Leslie Higgins, plays the wizard as a school principal who teaches the alchemy class himself.

Which carmaker sponsored the 1964 Italian comic in which Merlin from The Sword in the Stone conjures Donald Duck a car?

Fiat paid for the story, in which Merlin replaces Donald's broken-down 313 with a brand-new 850 whose magic helps the ducks finish their mission.

Which 12th-century cleric first gave the wizard Merlin, later the star of The Sword in the Stone, his familiar form?

Geoffrey of Monmouth Latinised the name of the Welsh bard Myrddin as Merlinus, blending several historical and legendary figures into one wizard.